SonOfMike

In other news, I've wanted a road vehicle of some kind for a while and finally decided to treat myself. Today I took delivery of an Oxford Diecast HO scale 1957 Chevrolet Nomad. I think I can get away with it both when running in "transition era" mode, with steam locos and a diesel or when running in 80s mode with the later diesels on the basis that by then it's a "classic" (or an old banger). Anyway, it's my train set and I'll do what I like .

Had a bit of a play today and had the new extension, main board and fiddlestick all connected together for the first time. Having somewhere for the trains to come from and go to has transformed the layout operationally for me. The extension may only separated from Apocrypha by a hole in the backscene in reality but in my imagination it's miles away. . I now potentially have the world's largest micro layout - it fills up one side of my kitchen, using the breakfast bar and an old keyboard stand. It was difficult to get a photo that showed it all but I think you get the idea from the picture below. I'm really fired up to get cracking on the extension now; lots of structure building ahoy.

I'm slowly getting there. A bit more bodging during lunch breaks on the days when I have been working from home and there is a bit more to see. Apologies for the poor photograph, the light indoors wasn't great despite the weather and I didn't want to move the board outside as the glue was still wet in a few places. The track has been painted and a backscene put together and fixed temporarily; I will need to remove it for scenic work but having it in place helps me compose the final scene in my head. "That flippin' building", which has been looking for a home since I built it, now potentially has somewhere to live. The various bits of white foamboard are just me playing with locations for various structures etc. The composition is very much a work in progress currently and the footprints and locations of potential buildings are not definite. I do have an idea for the scene but I don't want to give much away at this point in case I change my mind. I also have an idea for disguising the hole in the sky but I'll keep that to myself now too, for similar reasons.

Well, I think I've had a fairly productive weekend, despite the heat. Friday was a trip up to the retail park to get another floating shelf to act as the baseboard for the new section (slightly smaller than the Apocrypha board) plus supplies to make the backscene etc. Yesterday I had a stroll up to my local model shop (Baz's Model Rail in Yardley, Birmingham - no affiliation, I'm just a happy customer) for some track, a few other bits and bobs and a natter, and then today I actually started doing something with it all. The track is on the board (Copydex still drying in places), it's wired up and it works. I tested it linked up to the fiddle stick rather than the main board but I'm confident all will be well and I know the track aligns properly. The little switch at the bottom left of the board is for an isolating section at the end of one of the spurs. Next jobs, when I have time, will be to paint the track and make the 3 sided back scene.

For me it would have to be the West Side Lumber Company Railroad. It was photographs of Shays and Heislers in my Dad's copy of "Last of the 3 Foot Loggers" as a child that got me hooked on American railroads. D&RGS / D&RGW would come a pretty close second.

There has been progress!!! Nothing worth taking a photograph of, but things have happened nonetheless. I've been building up a to-do list for a while and collecting photographs for inspiration but I have been devoting my attention to another creative hobby of mine and I find it difficult to be active in both hobbies at once. I think it's just the way my mind is wired (I am also notoriously bad at multitasking) and I find that I need to finish what I am doing in one area before mentally changing gear and doing something else. Anyway, I have managed to get my head into modelling mode and started thinking about my second module. It's not going to be a waterfront now, because... reasons, but the fog is clearing and I have some ideas at last. Before I start on that there were some things I needed to do, and I have been doing those things today. Firstly, the backscene wasn't properly affixed; it was sort of semi-affixed but now its been made secure. Secondly, the wiring was a lash-up. Yes, I know there are only 2 wires involved but never underestimate my ability manage a bodge-job. Until today there was wire soldered to some track connectors which were just stuck on the left-hand end of the layout; this definitely needed changing before I could add an extension. Now there are two neat small wires soldered to the outside of the rail at the same end which run unseen to a socket on the front of the layout. The controller plugs into the socket currently, but the same socket will be used to join the layout electrically to the new module when I get around to it. Well done me! Thirdly, I have started building a fiddle stick for the other end of the layout. I say "building" but "lashing up" or "bodging" would be more accurate. It's all glued together from some bits of wood that came as part of the packing for a flat-pack bathroom unit I bought a while ago, which I had kept because I thought they could be useful some day. Once the glue has dried and I have stuck one remaining piece to it I will order some track for it (unless it falls to pieces) and then I think operating sessions could be a bit more interesting as trains will have somewhere to come from and go to. Then I need to get cracking on the new module - a trip to the retail park for some supplies is in order. Watch this space....

There appears to be some sort of misunderstanding / argument outside Frenchie's place. Over at the depot, Mr and Mrs LeBlanc ignore each other, as seems to be the case most days according to Claudette.

Some activity at the catfish shack and the gun store. Meanwhile Daniel waits for Bernadette at the old juke joint

WARNING - EXTREMELY CRUEL CLOSE UPS ALERT!!!! Old man Anneka used to take the time to talk to his workforce, unlike his son, who after taking over the mill has adopted a "modern" management approach involving mostly folded arms and tutting

Well, the cakebox thing didn't happen; I lost my mojo. I think I may well be close to finding it again though, and once I've brushed off the dust and re-chromed it I may start planning the extension to Apocrypha properly. In the meantime, one of the things I have wanted to add to the layout is people. I have been looking online for ages and not found any that I liked - I could find nudists, fairies, brass bands and photographers etc. but no "generic people doing nothing specific". Anyway, a visit to my local model shop (Baz's Model Rail in Yardley Birmingham - no affiliation just a very happy customer) for some detail bits ended in me being allowed to have a rummage through a jar of mixed miscellaneous second hand figures that they had acquired. I selected about a dozen and was charged next to nothing for them. The following posts contain pictures taken by my 12 year old daughter for me - they show some of the townspeople of Apocrypha for the first time...

Keith, have you seen this before?

It really is stunning. Excellent work.

I have decided that I am not going to pursue this any further and therefore will not be completing the diorama or entering the competition. I just don't have any enthusiasm for model making at the moment; all of my mojo is for my other hobbies currently, so that's where I am investing my time. I keep saying to myself that I "must do some more of the cakebox challenge" but it feels more like a chore that I need to complete, in the same way that I keep telling myself "I need to cut back the bushes in the front garden", and I hate gardening. I'll do some more modelling in the future but for now I will just enjoy looking at other people's work on RMWeb. Good luck to everyone with your entries.

Love the rust on that little shed

It certainly is - one man's rubbish is another man's treasure, as they say. I am not counting any actual railway items as rubbish for this build, nor will I be counting all "found materials". My personal definition of rubbish is that it has to be a non-railway / non-modelling item that would be destined for the bin / recycling if I hadn't used it.

And this is how they have been used: The reject prints have been stuck to the backscene and the card and packing have been used, along with a PVA and kitchen roll papier mache type concoction, to form the base of what I hope will be a retaining wall and bit of rocky hillside. A scrap of craft foam has been stuck to the cardboard and a bit of old track is now resting approximately where it will be stuck. The track is completely wrong really - it's OO code 75 bullhead and it should be flat bottomed but life's too short to worry about such things. Once something is on the rails and it's all ballasted etc. I don't think it will be too obvious. The wall and hilly bit will be blended into the backscene with undergrowth and trees etc. I hope. The building is just plonked in place while I try and compose the scene. Sorry about the poor photos - bad light, bad phone camera and even worse photographer.

I haven't had as much time as I hoped today, nor enough light for any decent photos but I'll share what progress there is. Firstly, some more rubbish: some still foam packing which will be used as the base for a bit of landscaping, some card from a box and some reject prints from when the printer was running out of toner (the print on the right is how the colours should have come out). I had scooped these up with some other prints and kept them by mistake so I thought I should use them.

Of course, I only use it for weighting down things that I am glueing together... honest guv!

Here are a few pictures of the building that will form much of the scene. It's built from odds and sods and already includes an item of rubbish - the cyclone air filter on the left hand side is made from bits of sprue and the end of a defunct ball point pen. I won't include this item as one of my bits of rubbish though as it was started before the challenge was announced. The three main sections still need sicking together and it needs barge boards and signage, amongst other things, to finish it off.

It's one of my favourites too.

Well the threatened new module has still not materialised, but seeing what @Keith Addenbrooke has been doing in the latest Cakebox Challenge inspired me to have a go myself and to finish off the building I stated and use it as part of my own entry - we'll see how I get on.

Keith, your build has inspired me to have a go at the challenge myself .

The reason for the base being slightly undersize is to allow for some mountboard to facilitate a backscene on two sides and to neaten the edges and hide the corrugations on the other two sides. The two narrower strips will be painted eventually.

I recently bought a new chair in an attempt to save my back from this working from home thing. I thought the box would do for the base, so I cut a couple of pieces slightly under 8 X 8 inches square (there is a reason for this) and laminated them with the corrugations at 90 degrees to each other. The result seems fairly strong and it will be covered with a thin layer of craft foam to help protect it from sogginess when it comes to scenery later.

OK, well after a bit of mithering and procrastination I have decided to throw my hat into the ring for the latest January 2021 Cakebox Challenge. My get-up-and-go, modelling-wise, had got up and gone and I thought this maybe a way of getting my mojo back. Also, I had started a few months ago on a building that I didn’t have an immediate use for. I simply don’t have the time or the storage space at the moment for the extension module for my micro layout that I was considering and so I thought maybe I could finish it and use it as part of this challenge, with a view to using it on the extension at a later date. A quick test revealed that the building was slightly too long to fit on an 8 X 8 inch base parallel to the edges but it would fit on the diagonal. This in turn meant that I potentially would have some compositional challenges to deal with, and that piqued my interest. My idea is to build a scene depicting some tiny part of a backwoods logging railroad. My plan is that it will feature some / all of the following depending how I get on: The building, pine trees, some rough track, a timber retaining wall and a rocky outcrop, the usual scenic treatment (backscene, ground cover, grass, bushes etc.) and a freelance geared steam locomotive (somewhere between a Dunkirk, a Climax and a Heisler). I will be using as many found materials, items from the scrap box and bits of rubbish as I can. I appreciate though that there is a fine line between rubbish and bits and bobs that I have kept because I am a hoarder and thought may come in useful one day. I will therefore nominate the two items that I am classing as my items of rubbish when I have finished the build, even though the rules state that “how you define rubbish is to you”. I will point out all the other bits that I am using that fit my own classification of rubbish. My daughter has threatened to help me but I’ll see how that pans out. I may end up doing most of it on my own.